


Fears of the Fearless

by ptw30



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Gen, Kinda, Season 2, Space Dad Shiro (Voltron), paladin group hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-31
Updated: 2017-10-31
Packaged: 2019-01-27 14:33:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,178
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12583964
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ptw30/pseuds/ptw30
Summary: For Platonic VLD Week, Day 2: Inside/Outside: Everyone has insecurities, and when the paladins literally share head holes, no one can hide their fears forever – even their fearless leader.





	Fears of the Fearless

**Author's Note:**

> Can be read as a sequel to [“Space Dreams,”](https://ptw30.tumblr.com/post/158821463539/ficlet-space-dreams) but doesn’t have to be. 

The first time they saw into everyone’s head holes, Lance’s thoughts easily drifted to his grounding source. In fact, every one of the paladins went to their “safe place.” Shiro thought of the Kerberos mission – what he’d worked a lifetime to achieve; Keith, his shack, where he’d lived with his father and reunited with Shiro; Lance his extended family; Hunk his food; and Pidge her brother.

But as they formed Voltron again and again, it wasn’t “head holes” they were seeing into, Lance noticed. It was their souls. And little by little, the team began to see more intimate details.  

Food was Hunk’s way of connecting to the world and the people closest to him. He’d cook and bake the dishes his family and friends enjoyed most, and he took great joy in watching his loved ones savor every last morsel.

Technology was as much a passion as an escape for Pidge, a way to understand what nature couldn’t explain, and though it was hard for her to accept the lion-paladin bond, perhaps it was the only mystery she didn’t dare unravel – because it gave her the fellow paladins and a place to belong.

Keith was an orphan. That revelation came as a shock to Lance, though in retrospect, perhaps it shouldn’t have. Alone in the shack, alone in the world, Keith liked it quiet because that was all he’d ever known. Other than Shiro, Keith had no one else, but as they continued to form Voltron, Lance thought he felt the prickling of acceptance, of want, from Keith – to never let go of these people with whom he learned he could not live without.

Lance missed his family. Everyone could feel that longing in his core, and though he would never stop fighting to get back to Earth, he learned to appreciate and celebrate his new family – this quirky little band of paladins whom he cherished just as much as the people back home.

And he learned that the first place they showed each other, the first place they all visited, was each’s “safe place.” Not the place they went to escape and feel secure, but rather the ideal they presented to the world.

Because Hunk sometimes worried about the mission and the entirety of it. How could they hope to topple the emperor of 95% of known universe? Surely not with his skills, culinary and otherwise.

And Pidge – she feared that one day, she’d annoy them with her science babble and too-unfamiliar jargon and they’d reject her like everyone else but Matt had.

And Keith – what happened if he lost these people like he’d lost his father? What if he lost Shiro –  _again_?

And Lance – what if he wasn’t good enough? What if the paladins realized they didn’t need him? What if they wanted him only because Blue chose him?

They never fell too far into despair because every time Lance thought of his insecurities, Blue curled her comforting presence around him, like a soothing brook that washed away his fears. And then Shiro met him at the end of the Blue’s snout, drawing him into a one-armed hug.

“You did great out there, Lance,” Shiro said, voice pitched with more than just reassurance. Genuine affection. “With you, we wouldn’t have gotten through that fight.”

Hunk then made his favorite dinner and Pidge elbowed him as he passed, and Keith offered him one of his rare smiles.

But when it came to Shiro – Shiro was a mystery. He rarely bled his insecurities into their link, and when he did, it was usually something about the arena or his time in a Galra prison. But after Shiro returned from bonding with his lion and the rest brought back the teludav lenses, something felt off. Their bond lingered, even though they hadn’t formed Voltron in weeks, but Lance felt something foreboding and uncertain through the link.

After they formed Voltron to fight a zombified robeast above Balmera, Lance discovered why.

Shiro had learned something in the astral plane – that the Black Lion had chosen him over Zarkon, which solidified their bond. But the lions – they’d been formed from a comet, first discovered by the  Paladins of Old. But the Paladins of New were different. They’d all come from Earth. Why?

Had Black chosen Shiro first? Which meant, Shiro had chosen Keith.  _Of course_  he’d chose Keith as his right arm and Red Lion. And Shiro chose Katie because of how much she reminded him of Matt. And Lance – he’d met Lance once, signed an autograph, shaken his hand. Did he know what potential lay just underneath the skin from that one meeting?

 _Potential?_  Lance all but squawked once he heard Shiro’s thought about him, but it wasn’t enough to break Shiro’s spiraling dark thoughts.

Hunk, he’d never met, but he must have taken some direction from Lance, who couldn’t be the legs of Voltron without his best friend.

Shiro had chosen them  to fight in an endless war. He’d condemned teenagers –  _children_  – to sacrifice their lives for others. He’d pitted them against the emperor of the universe. And for what? So they could give and suffer and die for him –

 _ENOUGH!_  Lance shouted, breaking the spell, and then Keith sunk his blade into the robeast’s chest.

Once they broke and returned to the Castle of Lions, Lance was out of Blue in a shot. That was the insecurity Shiro hid from them. That was his burden – he believed he was somehow at fault for the lions’ selection of their paladins. As if he had any say as the Black Paladin.  _Absurd_. But even if he had –

Shiro meandered down the ramp of Black, pulling off his helmet, flush and sheepish.

“Guys, I – ”

There wasn’t anything to say other than, “There’s nowhere else I’d rather be.”

Shiro blinked and stumbled a step as if hit. “What?”

“Ditto,” Pidge interjected.

“Same here,” added Hunk.

Keith shrugged, arms crossed in that ever petulant stance. “You promised me you’d take me on your next mission, so if you’d chosen anyone else, I’d be pissed.”

Lance could make the argument that Keith was already pissed, but instead, he lunged, besieging Shiro in a sudden hug.

“I doubt you could have persuaded a giant metaphysical cat to pick me for her paladin, but if you did… _thanks_.”

And Lance meant it. Even if he missed Earth and his family. Even if he died on this mission – he’d die for a cause, fighting alongside these incredible people whom he couldn’t imagine living without.

Shiro didn’t seem to know what to say, but his helmet clinked to the ground as he held Lance. Keith jumped in, followed by Pidge and Hunk, and they stayed in their reassuring embrace until Coran and Allura called for them.

Lance doubted they were done – Shiro would need a lot more convincing to believe that he hadn’t somehow doomed them to a life of heartache and pain, but they’d get there eventually. After all, every time they formed Voltron, they shared a soul. And Shiro could feel the truth for himself.


End file.
